The Malik Report

ESPN's Craig Custance penned an Insider-only column pondering potential "winners" and "losers" of a lockout-shortened season, and while I can't share the entire story with you, the last three paragraphs will be doubly true when the Red Wings cancel training camp in a week or less:

The arena workers, hotel owners, bartenders and everyone else losing out: Lost in the battle as the NHL owners and players figure out how to divide record revenues is the fact that real people are hurt by a lockout. For example, in Traverse City, Mich., the Red Wings' annual prospect tournament normally would be naming a champion Wednesday. But the looming lockout meant the Red Wings had to scrap plans for the tournament this season and Red Wings training camp in Traverse City is now in serious trouble.

From the land of, "Holy *#$%@&, I haven't been this sick in over a year, and it's been two bloody weeks with this virus" land (sorry)...

At this point, it appears that a lockout is all but inevitable, and that we're at least going to miss a couple of months of hockey given that--as TSN's Darren Dreger and player agent Allan Walsh have noted--the NHL chose to change the definition of hockey-related revenues in its proposals, yielding a necessary translation from Finnish to Swahili every time the two sides talk about cutting up the pie.

I'll be back in force a little later today (sorry, stupid sinus infectino persists), but here's something to tide you over: Red Wings play-by-play announcer Ken Daniels spoke to The Fan 590's Greg Brady and Jim Lang this morning, answering some pressing questions about the Wings' season-to-be (whenever it starts...):

Paul here for George who tells me he will be back sometime later today/tonight.

Detroit, MI… The Detroit Red Wings® today announced that tickets to several of the events comprising the 2012 SiriusXM Hockeytown Winter Festival™ at Comerica Park™ are now on sale to the general public. Tickets to the 48th Annual Great Lakes Invitational, a regular season American Hockey League contest and the first outdoor doubleheader in Ontario Hockey League history are now available for purchase at the Joe Louis Arena Box Office (313-396-7575), all Ticketmaster (800-745-3000) outlets and online at DetroitRedWings.com.

Tickets to these events are priced between $18 and $38 apiece. A full schedule for the 2012 SiriusXM Hockeytown Winter Festival™ at Comerica Park™ can be found below

With two full days' worth of Red Wings catching-up to do for this blog and two days' worth of CBA rhetoric to catch up on for the job that's probably going to become my main occupation when the Red Wings go on "hiatus," and none of that work getting done tonight...

I'm going to try to put this in a way that won't cost me my job.

I am, first and foremost, a fan of the Detroit Red Wings and their players. Even though I'm strongly supporting the NHLPA in this labor dispute, as I did in 2004 and as I did in 1994, I think it's pretty bloody important for most every NHL and NHLPA member to understand the point of view that the backbone of their $3.3 billion industry generally comes from:

MLive's Ansar Khan spoke to several Red Wings players about the NHL's second CBA proposal to the players, and the players spelled the proposal out in plain English:

“It (the proposal) was a pig with lipstick on, instead of a pig,'' Detroit Red Wings forward Danny Cleary said on Thursday.

...

Cleary, who has been active in union matters for years and has attended a couple of meetings in New York this summer, said the league's second proposal wasn't much different than the first, even though it did not include the 24-percent rollback of salaries the NHL proposed in July.

“They're not calling it a rollback, but they'll take it through escrow,'' Cleary said.

Justin Abdelkader, who told Khan that he'll be re-signed by the Wings next week, agrees with Cleary's assessment, pointing out that it does little other than put PR pressure on the NHLPA to offer a response...

I'm more than a little under the weather, thus the lack of posts (sorry), but these two press releases from the Red Wings are noteworthy and, in the case of the first one, invole something you can enjoy this weekend:

… Event Patrons set to Enjoy Interactive Games and Enter-to-Win Raffles …

Detroit, MI… The Detroit Red Wings Experience presented by Coke Zero will be a part of this weekend’s Arts, Beats & Eats Festival – an annual event celebrating the quality of life in Oakland County . Taking place in downtown Royal Oak , this year’s Arts, Beats & Eats Festival will begin at 11:00 a.m. on Friday, August 31, and wrap up at 9:00 p.m. on Monday, September 3. The Red Wings’ mobile entertainment complex will be stationed in the event’s Meijer Kids Zone from 11:00 a.m. – 8:30 p.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and from 11:00 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. on Monday.

Okay, let me get this out of the way first: after spending three and a half hours reading up on Tuesday's CBA negotiations and the NHL's "meaningful" proposal: It's lipstick on a pig and a PR push by Bettman to insist that the NHL moved off its initial proposal, which it did not. This time, the 24-percent-ish rollback and cut down to about 45% of revenues is achieved through massive escrow withholdings, and it guarantees a round of dispersal draft-style buyouts.* The two sides can't agree on how to define hockey-related revenues, never mind how to split the HRR pie, but at least the sides are talking and exchanging proposals, even if they're window-dressing.

Anyway, as MLive's Ansar Khan reported, Red Wings GM Ken Holland may not attempt to engage in contract extension talk with Jimmy Howard or Valtteri Filppula until the new CBA's ground rules have been established, but Holland is actively searching for some sort of defensive help, and he confirmed as much to the Macomb Daily's Chuck Pleiness...

About The Malik Report

The Malik Report is a destination for all things Red Wings-related. I offer biased, perhaps unprofessional-at-times and verbose coverage of my favorite team, their prospects and developmental affiliates. I've joined the Kukla's Korner family with five years of blogging under my belt, and I hope you'll find almost everything you need to follow your Red Wings at a place where all opinions are created equal and we're all friends, talking about hockey and the team we love to follow.